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BOOK OF THE MONTH: HOMEFRONT: CHAPTER TWO
Melanie kicked the front door closed and sorted the mail: junk, bills, Jamie’s latest catalogue from that store in the mall that Melanie hated. She was, of course, the worst mother in the world because she wouldn’t let Jamie shop there. Mel was all for women owning their own sexuality and all that but she drew the line at hyper-sexualizing her daughter. If they both survived Jamie’s adolescence, maybe Jamie would thank her later.
She had her doubts, though. She put the envelopes in stacks, almost on autopilot until she came to a tan, card-sized envelope with a Fort Lewis return address. No name but then again, she didn’t need to read the name to know who it was from.
Her heart fluttered a tiny bit as she opened the belated birthday card. It was a squirrel holding a sign and wearing pink heart sunglasses. Happy Birthday Mel. – Gale.
In the fifteen years since their divorce, he’d sent a card every year and every year he’d screwed up the date. Still, it was a nice, if empty, gesture. He’d missed far more than just birthdays since their marriage had fallen apart all those years ago.
If she hadn’t seen him today, maybe she would have smiled at the stupid squirrel. But she had seen him today. Had been sorting through her reaction all damn day. She wasn’t angry. She wasn’t sad.
She was… she didn’t know how to handle the news that he’d moved to Killeen. She’d never expected that. How had he even gotten here? The last time Jamie had asked her dad to move closer to them, he’d said something about burning in hell before the Army sent him to Hood.
And yet, here he was. He’d caught her off guard. Completely off guard. And she hated that more than anything.
There was a thump on the ceiling. Then the sound of feet moving from her daughter’s bathroom down the hall to Jamie’s bedroom. It was a normal sound. Nothing about it should have set her heart to pounding rapidly in her chest. But there was something off. Something that set the hair on the back of Melanie’s neck on edge. She’d ignored her gut once before.
And she would never make that same mistake again. She rushed upstairs to find the bedroom door locked.
“Open the door, Jamie.” Her voice was deadly calm. She was proud of herself, actually. She managed to smother the kick of panic that sucked the air from her lungs.
“Just a sec, Mom.”
“I’m going to count to three, then I’m kicking this door in.” She’d done it before. Jamie knew better. She knewnot to lock the door. Fear gripped her throat, her voice tightening. “One.” More scrambling. “Two.”
The door swung wide, and her daughter rushed to fill the space. “What’s up?”
Melanie inhaled deeply. No drugs. No smell of antiseptic or rubbing alcohol. Jamie stood there, one arm behind her back. “What were you doing?”
“Homework.” Jamie blinked innocently.
Melanie didn’t buy it for a second. “What’s in your hand?”
“Nothing, Mom.”
Fear licked at her spine. Jamie was lying. Again. She grabbed the arm Jamie held behind her and shoved the sleeve up.
Pale scars crisscrossed Jamie’s forearm, but no fresh marks. Relief slithered over her skin.
Jamie yanked away, her mock innocent expression shuttering closed into the belligerent look Mel knew all too well. “I’m fine, thanks,” she said.
“You’re not allowed to block the door.” Melanie folded her arms as they prepared for the all-too-familiar battle.
“I can’t have any privacy?” Defiance looked back at her from Jamie’s eyes, eyes that looked so much like her father’s, except they were lined with a heavy black liner that no matter how many times Mel kept throwing it away, her daughter kept coming replacing.
Melanie sighed heavily, praying for patience. “You know the answer to that question.”
“You know, you treat me like a criminal. I might as well act like one.”
Melanie held out her hand. “Phone.”
“You have no right—”
Her temper snapped beneath the weight of the fear. “I have every right. You live in my house, you live under my rules. When you go to college, you can make your own rules.”
Jamie slapped her cell phone into her mother’s outstretched hand. “I can’t wait.”
The texts were blank. All that meant was that Jamie had gotten better at deleting them before Melanie caught her. She was hiding something. Mel just couldn’t figure out what.
“Come do your homework at the table.”
“I’m fine in here.”
Melanie lifted her eyes toward heaven, grinding her teeth. “It wasn’t a request, Jamie.”
Jamie made a disgusted sound and slammed the door shut with a bang. Melanie briefly considered for the hundredth time taking it off the hinges entirely.
But that wouldn’t really do any wonders for trying to rebuild trust like their therapist kept trying to get them to do, now would it?
She walked straight into the kitchen. She started to pull salad out of the fridge, then stopped. She leaned against the counter and focused on breathing slow and steady. Tears burned behind her eyes. Every single day was a new version of the same old fight.
Makeup. Phone. Homework. And those were the easy fights. They took up most of her energy, keeping the real fear buried. Waiting. Lurking in the dark for the right moment to strike back and remind her that she’d almost lost Jamie once.
That it could be happening again and Jamie would be able to hide it this time.
No, their therapist didn’t really understand the fear that Mel lived with. The fear of the tiny nicks in her daughter’s flesh. The blood that had circled down the drain, that left a faint stain that taunted Melanie with the epic levels of her failure as a parent.
The fear that her daughter was only pretending to be okay but was slowly spiraling out of control again, and there was nothing Melanie could do to stop it.
Not for the first time, she wished she’d found someone to share the load with. But the few times she’d dated hadn’t really gone anywhere serious. She had her hands full with Jamie. Most men, even the good ones, wouldn’t stand for being second place. She didn’t blame them, honestly.
But damn, she was tired of being alone.
“Mom?”
Mel lowered her hands. Jamie stood near the wide arch that led into their living room, her books clutched to her chest. For once, she didn’t look like she was ready to fight at the drop of a hat. For a brief moment, she saw her little girl, looking at her with worry in her eyes when she’d caught Mel crying once. For a moment, it was just Jamie standing there.
Mel would do anything to hold onto that moment. To make it last longer than a few heartbeats.
Melanie lifted her chin and straightened. Took a deep breath and tried to change the tone of their evening. “Sorry. Rough day at work. Any preferences for dinner?”
“Macaroni and cheese?” Jamie said hopefully.
“Sure.” She wasn’t going to win any Parent of the Year awards for feeding her kid mac and cheese out of a box, but then again, your kid ending up in the hospital for cutting herself pretty much already ended any chances of that.
Oh, she knew on an intellectual level that what Jamie had done wasn’t her fault. That it was a mental health issue and blah blah blah.
But that didn’t stop the guilt that rode on Melanie’s chest. That burned beneath her heart every single day. Why had she missed the signs? What could she have done better? Why did she and Jamie have to fight so much?
It felt like they’d been fighting since the day she’d been born.
Jamie paused where she’d been setting her books on the kitchen table. She looked sideways at Mel and said cautiously, “It must have been a really bad day at work.”
“It was.” She couldn’t come up with the words she needed to tell her daughter about Gale. How would Jamie react? Mel honestly didn’t know. Jamie hadn’t seen her father since before his last deployment.
Melanie offered a faint smile that she wished she felt and tried to hold onto the oh-so-fragile peace between them. “So how’s school?” She knew she was supposed to ask questions that didn’t involve responses like “fine” or “good.” But she didn’t know what to ask anymore.
“Fine. Sold any houses this week?” Jamie asked. Such a neutral question.
As though Mel hadn’t just been treating her like a suspect a few minutes before. Like Jamie hadn’t just caught her mom standing in the kitchen fighting tears. “I’ve got a closing on Thursday.”
“That’s good, right?”
“It is.” Mel pulled a box out of the pantry. Food was another thing they fought about. Mac and cheese was one of the few fail-safe dinners. The doorbell rang. Mel paused and looked toward it. The UPS man was the only person who ever came this late in the afternoon. “Start the water?” she asked.
For once, Jamie didn’t argue. Mel wasn’t going to second-guess the moment’s peace. She was sure there would be another fight before they went to bed. It sucked. There was no other way to put it.
She opened the door looking down, expecting her latest book.
Instead her gaze fell on a pair of dusty combat boots. Boots that damn sure weren’t supposed to be on her doorstep.
And they damn sure weren’t supposed to belong to Gale.
CONTINUE READING…
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